We are delighted to announce our work for the RSPB producing this vibrant animated film for the RSPBInner Forth Landscape Initiative to educate local school children about the history of the Inner Forth’s changing landscape. Detailing the influencers for these changes and looking into the future for the area, the film is to be used as an educational support tool for local primary and secondary schools in the region. You can watch the film in full online at this link and also hear a little about the project from our client’s perspective at this RSPB blog by Project Assistant for the Inner Forth Futurescape Project, Ami Kirkbright.

On Sunday 4th of March, Nae Pasaran, an independent feature documentary film by Edinburgh based Debaser Filums, charting the true story of the Scottish anti-fascist, peaceful, civil disobedient workers who defied the Chilean dictator Pinochet, had it’s it’s world premiere screening, at the closing gala for the 2018 Glasgow Film Festival. The film had an overwhelmingly positive reception from the audience with an almost endless standing-ovation as the closing credits rolled. It was lovely to see the film receive the reception that it deserves as it’s a brilliant and deeply moving piece of storytelling. We were doubly proud as Interference Pattern provided the visual effects sequences for the film. Working on an incredibly constrained budget, our team poured many weeks of our own time into the project to ensure that director Felipe Bustos Sierra received the shots he needed. Our work involved a wide range of shots, from fully realised virtual environments, complex time-lapse sequences to the destruction of architectural treasures.

“I’d spent the weeks before Move Summit watching our production team shrink as one-by-one my colleagues got roped into the monumental effort that is organising an animation festival.

My job was to hold the fort at Interference Pattern HQ though, so that meant that when I made it to Move Summit on the Friday I could relax and enjoy myself as a delegate. And I had a fantastic time!

As I arrived at the venue I bumped into a few industry acquaintances who were looking a bit worse for wear after Drink and Draw the evening the before. (They admitted to having done a bit more drinking than drawing.)

Packed out private room for Move Summit guests at Brewdog for Drink and Draw

With coffee and pastries in-hand we headed into two of the stand-out talks of the event: Dr Stuart Sumida: Animal Anatomy Consultant, and Mathieu Muller: Unity Field Engineer. Both speakers were absolutely inspirational and mobbed by people wanting to ask questions afterwards (Mathieu was so happy to take questions and chat to delegates that he eventually had to be rescued for lunch before the sandwiches ran out).

Dr Stuart Sumida anatomy expert flew into from the U.S.A to join us at Move Summit

Neil Riley’s Electric Theatre Collective talk was the highlight of my afternoon. Partly because of the creative and open-minded way they approached their Great Western Railways commercial – but mainly because Neil admitted that a couple of shots were still at pre-vis stage just weeks before final delivery. Clearly they pulled it off brilliantly and delivered a fantastic piece of work on time but it’s good to know that in the creative industries, where you’re trying to achieve something new with every project, it’s rarely the case that things progress in a nice smooth linear fashion. Having a decent contingency plan-B (or G, or Z) is more important than sticking rigidly to plan-A, and that gives you the freedom to break new ground creatively as you work.

Then, when the afternoon talks had finished and someone had handed my my first beer of the evening I got to catch up with friends & colleagues, chat to some of the day’s speakers, and meet some passionate and talented students and industry-entrants.

Whilst the speakers and talks at Move Summit were top-class and genuinely inspirational, I think what struck me most was how much it served as a melting pot and incubator of ideas. I heard studios giving from-the-coalface feedback to a unity developer who, in turn, was musing on how to implement some of the creature morphology commandments laid down by a anatomy professor. At the other end of the spectrum I spoke to loads of student who’d got a real insight into the industry and had feedback and advice directly from representatives of studios that they dream of working in one day.

Finally, after a few more beers, I had to call it a day and headed home buzzing from such a fantastic event (and also relieved that I wasn’t part of the clean-up team the next morning).”

Producer at Interference Pattern

Here’s the top 5 aspects which make Move Summit very, very special! From my perspective as co- founder and director for 2017 and 2018, but influenced by lovely comments on the day too!

1. Speakers who hang out all day and night!

The great thing about our speakers at Move Summit, is they tend to get absorbed in everything that is going on during the day and evening! I’ve been to many events across the globe where speakers rush in and out for their talks, without time to take a breath and talk with other delegates. With Move we’ve been so fortunate that our speakers love to stick around – they arrive early, they leave late and they do a lot of organised and informal helping in between. This has taken the form of our returning creative reviews for students, new speed pitching sessions, all alongside answering one to one questions after their talk, and mingling with the delegates for our evening activities. Quite often our speakers are among the first and last ones standing! On that note, stamina winners for last standing place are in 3rd. Mathieu Muller of Unity 2nd. Damien O’Connor of Brown Bag Films 1st . Paul Wells of Animation Academy But who wins this year’s Speaker Hero Award?

Neil Riley of Electric Theatre Collective doing the speed pitching sessions along with many other industry reps

Last year the award went to duo Lee Greatorex and Doug Lamour of MPC for making to Move after an extremely long delay in Storm Dorris. This year the Speaker Hero Award goes to Tom Box of Blue Zoo! Who delivered three talks in one day – his own talk on his animated short film Mamoon & other works, followed by last minute stepping in for a talk on ANIMDOJO, and thereafter graciously accepted an invite from Bafta Scotland to talk about his Bafta nominated film. Kudos!

2. Hungry attendees

Okay, animation delegates have a hearty appetite, on that note does anyone out there want to sponsor our catering? But we’re not referring to the eating hunger here, but the hunger to: learn, connect, make the most of your time at Move! The organisers feel it, but more importantly the speakers feel it (thanks to living screenwriting legend Paul Wells for coining the term!) It makes their time worth while as they want to be helpful. There is not one blase or bored attendee at Move (we even had emotionally moved delegates with the Blue Zoo film screening).

This is why our speaker have already asked to come back, as they know they’re donating their free time (off their normal day where they earn money) to a worthy cause where they had fun in the process, they like our vibe. The added bonus is speakers become ambassadors to help spread the word of Move, and this year we’ve an International Ambassador Dr Stuart Sumida from the USA who is consulting expert to animation studios all over the world. With another sold out event, the volunteers team time is truly valued too with a full attendance and high energy delegates.

Mathieu Muller of Unity 3D

Emerging talent break at Whitespace

Tom Box with Animdojo tips

Paul Wells of Animation Academy who has worked discussing the Seven Deadly Sins of Animation Screenwriting

3. Awesome sponsors

Move is a grass roots industry initiative, that is a community run and a non profit event and ticket income along isn’t enough to cover costs of the event. So we rely on industry sponsors to help make Move happen with their lovely thick wad of cash donation. But moreover, they donate in-kind – their time, their skills and expertise on the day or in the lead up to the event.

Our sponsors for 2018 included:

Axis Animation – made a donation, had many speakers at the event and did creative reviews

Heehaw – made a donation, delivered a workshop, did creative reviews and filmed the day

Interference Pattern – who were the lead organisers, donated time of five employees, curated speakers and sponsors, and brought together the winning team.

We created Move Summit as an scalable extension of our industry connection work with colleges and universities. We wanted to bring in world class speaker talent via our wider network, to give equal access and benefit to all students and professionals.

Our venue sponsors must be appreciated too:

The super cool space for creatives Whitespace who have supported Move since day dot, the place for tech and creative companies to be based – Codebase and for learning tech skills – Codeclan. Also our event run smoothly thanks to our expert AV suppliers and technicians Vision Events.

Bram Sels of Axis from Belgium & Dr Stuart Sumida from USA

Dr Stuart Sumida & Paul Wells screenwriter (inc Simpsons)

Curator Simon Haslett with MPCs Rob Hopper and Christian Guthrie

4. Volunteers who share your passions!

None of the volunteers day jobs are as event organisers, and the majority of them fit in Move planning in their spare time. So we may not be perfect, but we are passionate! Our team has that magic ingredient that money can’t buy, the same interests as you and they have your back! They want to help you: improve your knowledge and skills for career progression, make that connection whether for a job or creative collaboration, and to lift up your individual and the Scottish animation industry enterprising aspirations and to provide opportunities and pragmatic solutions for them to be realised.

Thanks to our terrific planning team who work great together, as the team contribute their talents and interests for suited roles akin to a studio, rather than having a committee structure

A big thanks everyone else who donated their time, including our volunteers on the day and our amazing hosts who love animation like you do – Kate O’Connor from Animation UK, Erik Ravaglia, Iain Gardner of Animation Garden, and Move’s own Caroline Parkinson of Interface.

Our Whitespace host, animator Erik Ravaglia

Scottish Animation Panel with curator Tom Bryant

Irish Animation Panel with curator Sharon Campbell

5. Cool tech & evening activities

During Move at Whitespace, we had the impressive Soluis demoing their ace VR work for Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. Evening activities at Move Late were popular as ever, as Holly-May Ward extended her organisation to develop a lovely relaxed evening of activities, on Thursday culminating with a Drink and Draw session at the lovely Brewdog pub. Friday night’s awesome Move Late included a cool tech exhibition and demo area with VR and AR for the crowds to don the goggles and be entertained. Bright Side Studios, Vitei Backroom giving us a world exclusive first play of their new game Paper Valley, and our very own Interference Pattern along with Articise with a demo of their recent VR work. With the addition of Stewart Brewing craft beer and pizza, and the magic ingredient of a hugely sociable crowd networking to the max closed the event perfectly.

Drink and Draw

VR Exhibitors Panel at Move Late

Vitei Backroom VR gaming

Bright Side Studios AR

Bright Side Studios

Stewart Brewing craft beer

Feedback

I couldn’t be at three venues and witness all the awesome goings on, so we need your help with your feedback as I’m sure I and the team missed loads! Along and with any links to your reviews/photos/blogs of 2018 and please complete the review survey. Who do you want to hear from and meet at Move Summit 2019? Send your ideas to info@movesummit.co.uk please. Thanks!

That’s all folks!

Jayne Coulthard

Co-Founder & Director of Move Summit – 2017 & 2018

Business & Community Manager at Interference Pattern

On the 15th and 16th of February the Move Summit animation and vfx festival took place here in Edinburgh. Move Summit is Scotland’s only dedicated animation industry event and now in only its second year, Move Summit has gained a large following from within the industry and education alike selling-out for consecutive years. This highlights the need for such an event and also serves to highlight the conspicuous absence of one, prior to the inaugural Move Summit in February of 2017.

The goals of the summit are to educate, promote and inspire within the animation, visual effects, visualisation and games industries, pulling together practitioners, students and studio representatives from around the world for two days of networking, discussion, learning and hopefully forging long lasting relationships. For the second year running, Interference Pattern acted as the keystone of the summit’s organisational team, a brilliant group with whom we pulled together an extensive programme, expanding on last years event in almost every area.

Mattieu Muller of Unity 3D talks with eager delegates after his presentation.

As one of the directors of Move Summit I had the pleasure this year of both coordinating the professionals schedule, in conjunction with Sharon Campbell (animation course leader at Duncan of Jordanstone in Dundee) as well as overseeing the operational and financial sides of the event management. It was a lot of responsibility to take on, especially alongside my duties as MD and creative director at the Interference Pattern studio but all of the hard work and long hours over the past few months have been absolutely worth it. The feedback that we have received from attendees and speakers has been overwhelmingly positive. We are already in the early planning stages for 2019’s event and looking at how we can incorporate feedback and consultations to continue to improve and evolve Move Summit, to deliver what the industry and education need from the event.

Delegates at Whitespace enjoying the talks

The professionals schedule was a packed programme of talks, panel discussions and workshops spread between two seperate venues, over two days. We had speakers from Aardman Animations, Blue Zoo, jellyfish Pictures, MPC, Axis Studios, Unity 3D, Electric Theatre Collective, Brown Bag, Boulder Media, Soluis, to name but a few! Pulling together such an extensive schedule was a challenge but we succeeded in not only upping the volume of content on last year but also maintaining the high quality levels that we set ourselves.

The Move Summit 2018 schedule in full – what a lineup!

Alongside the professionals and industry aspect of the schedule we ran a full days programme dedicated to emerging talent, which we define as those either currently engaged in full time education or the recently graduated who still have to find employment. This day featured workshops, inspirational talks and panels, all geared towards portfolio presentation and getting students fired up and job-ready. I was a member of a panel presentation discussing industry tips for students putting together their portfolios, in readiness for applying for work after graduation. It was reassuring to hear that all on the panel were virtually unified in our desires for what we like to see in a portfolio and how that should be presented to prospective studios.

A popular thread of last years summit, the student portfolio review sessions, were back this year by popular demand. Yet again we expanded on what we offered last year and were running review sessions throughout the two days of the festival. These reviews allowed students and artists to sign up for a 15 minute slot where they could present their portfolio work to an experienced professional for feedback and discussion. An excellent way to get students talking critically about their own artwork and also to get potentially good candidates in front of those studio representatives who need to see that work. Our team of reviewers was a crack-team, assembled from our wonderful guest speakers, studio leaders and department leads from within the Scottish industry, higher education course leaders, alongside talented artists currently employed within the Scottish animation industry. I doubt that many of the students attending would have expected that they would have the opportunity to present their work to the likes of Tom Box, MD of Blue Zoo, Tom feist-Wilson of Jellyfish Pictures, studio team-leads from Axis Studios or Mattieu Muller of Unity.

Emerging talent portfolio review sessions in full swing.

We capped the portfolio review thread of the summit off with a round of rapid-fire student speed-pitches, at the end of Friday’s speaking programme. Squeezed in before dinner and the Move Late after-party VR exhibition kicked off the students were all in a talkative mood and fired-up after the days excitement. yet again our group of gamely speakers and studio representatives stepped-up to the task, to field 30 minutes of thee lively drop-in sessions.

I had great fun participating in both the reviews and the speed pitches and really see this as one of the successes of the event. For me being able to facilitate getting artists at the start of their careers in front of those with the knowledge and advice was heartening to see and made me proud of what we have achieved so far with Move.

Student speed-pitching sessions in full swing.

Throughout the year and leading up to the event Interference Pattern has provided crucial financial and organisational support, forming a core of the organisational team. Our business and community development manager, Jayne Coulthard acting as Move Summit Director and myself as Financial and Operations Director and co-curator of the professionals programme. We worked throughout the year pulling together the threads of the event along with the wider organisational team, ramping up to almost full-time during January and February, making sure that we had all of the organisational details covered and everything needed in place. Even so, we were still up until the early hours the day before the event fixing all of the attendee and speaker names stickers to our lovely lanyard cards and improvising a solution to the problem of having ordered plastic pockets too small to hold the nicely printed cards we had printed to place inside.

A packed crowd for talks at the Codebase venue

This year the event was only made possible by our generous financial and in-kind support from our sponsors, a range of studios and companies who share our vision for the Move Summit and the positive message and action that it can take forwards about the Scottish animation industry, to the rest of the world. We truly are an industry-led event, by industry, for industry.

Finally a huge thanks and shout-out has to go out to Move’s sponsors, animation Interference Pattern, Axis Studios, Anime Ltd, HeeHaw, Stampede, Whitespace, Vision Events and Creative Europe. Alongside our key sponsors I also wish to thank all of our affiliate partners for helping to spread the word to their networks. Spreading the word to as many people as possible will enable the summit to grow and prosper and hopefuly the sector as a whole in scotland along with it.

Thanks from the organisation team to all those involved in this years Move Summit 18, be it speakers, volunteers or attendees.

We are looking forwards to showing what we can do with Move Summit 2019!